Donald And Dorothy — Mary Mapes Dodge

Mary Mapes Dodge (1831-1905) was an American children's writer and editor. In 1859 she began writing and editing, working with her father to publish two magazines, the Working Farmer and the United States Journal. Within a few years she had great success with a collection of short stories, The Irvington Stories (1864), and then with the novel for which she is best known; Hans Brinker; or, The Silver Skates (1865). A part of the novel became an American legend. In the novel a tale is read out in class: The Hero of Haarlem about a Dutch boy who saved his country by putting his finger in a leaking dike, and staying there all night in spite of the cold. The book was an an instant bestseller. Later in life she was an associate editor of Hearth and Home, edited by Harriet Beecher Stowe. She became an editor in her own right with the children's St. Nicholas Magazine, for she was able to solicit stories from a number of wellknown writers including Mark Twain, Louisa May Alcott, and Robert Louis Stevenson.